EPA transfers Hervey Tichon facility back to New Bedford

NEW BEDFORD — The 56,000-square-foot U.S. Environmental Protection Agency facility on Hervey Tichon Avenue, used for about 16 years to clean harbor sediment contaminated with probable carcinogens, now belongs to the New Bedford Port Authority. 

Mayor Jon Mitchell, accompanied by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and EPA officials, announced the property transfer Thursday at the newly decontaminated facility, calling it an “auspicious moment” for the port, city and region.

In the coming year, the port authority will extend the property's bulkhead at least 600 feet and use it to help with construction for the North Terminal expansion project.

The building, which has immediate rail access, is currently empty, but Port Director Ed Anthes-Washburn said the city may lease the space for commercial fish processing and freezing, adding some people have already expressed interest. 

"We're very excited," Anthes-Washburn said. "It was always the intention to revert [the facility] to the city and port authority control. The timing of it with the construction project, it really is a huge economic win for us and modernizing our infrastructure and providing new opportunities to the businesses that are here."

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Once the EPA completed underwater dredging of the harbor in 2020, the agency no longer needed the facility, which was used to squeeze water from sediment before it was packed in rail carts and sent to Michigan for disposal.

If the city today built a warehouse and marine bulkhead to the scale of this facility, Mitchell said it would cost $30 to $40 million. Instead, New Bedford received it from the EPA, which the mayor compared to winning "a lot of new cars" in a sweepstake.

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Mitchell and EPA officials said project workers have removed over 1 million cubic yards of contaminated sediment since work began. That equates to Gillette Stadium filled 500-feet high, said Dennis Deziel, regional administrator for the EPA New England Region 1.

Of that, 600,000 cubic yards of material passed through the dewatering facility, which is approximately 50,000 dump trucks, Col. John A. Atilano II, commander at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New England District, said.

Mitchell noted this transfer marked the "tremendous progress" that has been made in cleaning the site in recent years, which was largely due to the 2012 AVX Corp. settlement that provided $366 million in site funding. The electronics manufacturer, previously Aerovox Corp., dumped chemicals into the harbor for decades, contributing to the contamination that exists today. 

David Dickerson, a project manager for the Superfund site, said by 2022 there will only be a few million dollars left from the settlement. Any remaining funds needed to complete the project will be budgeted from national EPA Superfund allocations. 

"New Bedford became in the early eighties America's first marine Superfund site, which is not a distinction that we’re exactly proud of, and it is one that frankly has inhibited economic development over many years," Mitchell said.

Today, the harbor is "far cleaner," he said, noting ecological improvements like more fish and clearer water. Regarding economic development, Mitchell said the newly obtained facility and its bulkhead would play a significant role for the growing port and future offshore wind projects.

Officials could not guarantee an end date for the project, though Deziel estimated it should be done in about five years. However, fish caught in the harbor will continue to be contaminated for the foreseeable future, said Mitchell and the EPA.

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The EPA is holding a public meeting Wednesday, Jan. 13 to discuss 2020 activity, such as the closure of the dewatering facility, as well as cleanup plans for 2021, which include more salt marsh restoration.